Disclaimer: I do not own the Fate franchise it belongs to Kinoko Nasu and Type-Moon.
Everything and Nothing
Chapter 10
"So that's their base of operations?" Rin asked. "A rented, 16th Century villa on a rocky island out in the Adriatic Sea…it's like something out of a James Bond movie."
The three of them – Rin, Sakura, Little Rin (though she was in astral form) – had rented a small boat and were now making their way out of the Venetian Lagoon into the Adriatic Sea. And there in the distance, slowly growing bigger with every minute, was their destination. Isolla della Passione, Passion Isle, a small rock jutting out like a fist from the depths of the sea, with a villa first raised by some French lordling in times past.
Of course, now it was owned by some Italian land company who rented it out to various individuals for various purposes. Like a certain Romanian magus and his band of thugs…
…though for once, it seemed Forvedge had sent one of their own to lead yet another effort to murder her. Considering their track record thus far, Sakura wasn't sure whether to be impressed or unfazed.
"So you know about James Bond at least." Sakura remarked.
Rin shrugged. "I'm not completely ignorant of popular culture." She said. "Besides, what can I say? Pierce Brosnan makes for quite the eye candy."
"Eye candy?" Sakura deadpanned. "Really?"
"I don't want to hear that coming from a yaoi fangirl." Rin scoffed, and Sakura turned pink.
"I'm not a…anyway!" she spluttered out before quickly changing the topic, causing Rin to give a small smile of victory. "Nice work with our cloak, I might be able to pull something similar off, but nothing as…clean, as yours, with the ether element."
"Thanks." Rin said with a nod, holding a long shard of quartz crystal in one hand. It gently shone with all the colors of the rainbow, Rin using it to focus her ether elemental magecraft to bend light around them, making them invisible to the naked eye. "That said, the cloak only keeps us from getting seen. If they notice us by other means, well, we're made. At least, we would be, if it weren't for your shields."
At that, Rin nodded at one of the four, slowly-spinning spheres of utter blackness that surrounded the boat, and which would pull in anything shot or cast at them by an enemy which managed to pierce Rin's cloak. They uncomfortably reminded her a little too much of the events of the Fifth Holy Grail War, but she knew better.
They only had a similar appearance due to being based on Imaginary Numbers, warping space around them.
And most importantly, they had none of the sheer…malevolence, that the Shadow had possessed.
"I'm sure you could figure something similar out yourself." Sakura said.
"Maybe," Rin conceded. "But without Imaginary Numbers, spatial manipulation isn't something I can do casually. Not like you can. I'd need a ten-count, maybe drop it down to a five-count after a decade or two."
Sakura tilted her head in acknowledgement of the returned compliment. Then she narrowed her eyes at the island in the distance, and at the docks stretching out from the base of the rock. Several other boats were there, but no one else, all the way to the rock and then up the narrow staircase cut into the island and leading to the sheltered crevice which housed the villa.
Le Nid de Moineau: the Sparrow's Nest.
"They'll be waiting for us on the inside, then." Little Rin said, as she faded into view.
"Give them hell, little big sister." Sakura cheerfully replied.
Little Rin didn't answer at once, instead giving a small but cruel smile, her face growing tighter even as her irises flashed red. "Gladly." She said.
Sakura smiled just as cruelly, and despite herself, so did Rin.
These people messed with their family, and even tried to kill them. No one did that. Never again.
And they would die for even trying.
Gunfire erupted from all sides, mercenaries entrenched behind sandbags before the pillared galleries on both sides of the atrium. On the roofs of the galleries, more mercenaries opened fire, as well as from the pillared porch of the villa. MP5 Submachine Guns mostly, but also several G3 Battle Rifles and M245 Machine Guns capable of spitting out heavier fire.
Hollow thuds echoed only to be all but drowned out by the gunfire, as grenade launchers launched explosive and incendiary rounds into the atrium. Explosions shook the air, but the mercenaries weren't finished. On the second floor above the porch, men sank to one knee, shouldering Panzerfausts.
"CLEAR!" other men shouted, before rockets ignited with loud roars.
More explosions erupted, shaking the villa itself and sending smoke and debris fountaining into the air. For five minutes it continued, the mercenaries expending over a thousand rounds of ammunition at the small figure which literally pranced up the steps and into the atrium.
"CEASEFIRE!" the order went out.
They might be soldiers of fortune, but they were still soldiers for all that. And so they obeyed in good order, guns falling silent and hot lead no longer filling the air. As it was, it still took nearly a whole minute for the smoke and debris in the atrium to clear.
"…no way…" one mercenary whispered, even as a child's giggling echoed eerily in the atrium.
"What?" Little Rin asked, standing completely unharmed in the middle of the otherwise ruined and blasted atrium. "Is that all?"
All around them, the mercenaries were faltering, struck by an unreal sense of terror. Fingers froze and refused to obey the urge to open fire, just as legs failed to rise and run. Sweat broke all around, pouring in sheets and soaking the men's clothes, even as eyes widened and bodies trembled in foreboding.
Little Rin smiled. "My turn." She said.
Her eyes then glowed white, electricity arcing over her body and down her limbs, even as she held out both hands, palms facing the sky. She brought them up, and then down, her body rising several inches into the air…
…and with the booming of violently displaced air, a lightning storm erupted. Crackling bolts lanced up from Little Rin for several meters, before branching out in a glowing dome. Lightning lashed out, stroking men across the villa's rooftops, and then down, to those hidden in the porch and galleries. They screamed as the lightning tore into them, burning their clothes and melting their skin black, fat oozing as flesh sloughed off and bone cracked and sizzled.
Explosions burst out all around, as grenades and other explosives lying around were set off by the explosion. So it went for about ten seconds, and then the lightning storm petered out, over half a hundred men reduced to smoking corpses in that small amount of time.
Then Little Rin advanced, walking forward with her eyes still glowing and lightning still dancing over her body.
More men came in response, staying inside the villa and shooting out the foyer's windows. Bullets just passed harmlessly through Little Rin's form, as did explosions and shrapnel. She sniffed, and then holding out her hands before her, let the lightning pool between them. Then with a shout, she let loose, lightning streaking out to hit the men in the foyer.
Those next to the windows died first, but they weren't the last. Instead, the lightning arced from man to man inside, forming a chain of electrical death that left the foyer littered with smoking corpses.
But Little Rin wasn't finished. She struck out a hand, palm outward, and shook the villa with a telekinetic blast, the bounded fields guarding the interior holding steady.
Frowning, she drew back, holding her hands in a circle at her waist, and pooling prana between them in a shimmering, mirage-like ball. Then she grinned, and began speaking words straight out of an anime.
"KA-ME-HA-ME-HA!" she yelled, throwing out her hands even as she said the last syllable.
It wasn't the same attack, not even close, but it did its job. The foyer and porch simply exploded, a gigantic plume of dust and debris blowing back over the rest of the villa and the island to the sea beyond.
It took several minutes for the cloud to clear, but when it did, the bounded fields were gone, along with the porch and foyer, leaving the crumbling interior exposed for further passage. "Sakura," Little Rin cast the thought out. "Rin, it's clear."
After a couple of minutes, both Rin and Sakura arrived, running up the stairway and into the ruined atrium. "Huh…" Rin began, observing the surroundings. "…not bad…nothing I wouldn't expect of myself, or my sister, if we ever go all out."
Sakura opened her mouth to reply…
…and then closed it as towering stone figures burst out of the pillars on the galleries to either side. There were six of them, hulking, faceless, humanoid figures with Aramaic script carved around their bodies.
"Golems." Little Rin sniffed. "Boring."
She held up a hand, and froze the golems in place. "You two go on ahead." She said. "I'll take care of these things, and watch your backs as planned."
Rin and Sakura nodded, and then running forward and past, left Little Rin behind. The vengeful spirit narrowed her eyes, and conjured six fireballs, one for each golem. At a thought, they began to spin, slowly at first, then faster and hotter, their color changing from red to orange, then to yellow, then blue, and finally white.
With another gesture, Little Rin sent the fireballs at the golems, who could do nothing but stand still as they were blown apart in sprays of debris and molten rock.
"…next." Little Rin dully said.
These golems were different, Sakura observed. They were still made of stone, but seemed to have steel skeletons as well as iron plating. The Aramaic script on their body wasn't simply carved anymore, but outright glowed with the light of prana.
It didn't really matter, though.
Rin's punch shattered metal and stone, sending the golem's remains flying across the entire room. It ruined the rich carpet on the floor, pitted the marble pillars, scarred the frescoed walls, and made the hanging candelabras overhead shake alarmingly.
"…naïve." Rin taunted with a smile that was equal parts amused and condescending, at the magus no doubt watching further inside. "How comically naïve…golems? This is the best you can do, after we tear through your cannon fodder? Just who do you think we are?"
One of the five remaining golems charged her, only for Rin to intercept, closing the distance in a heartbeat. Another punch shattered the golem, before she grabbed another golem and hurled it at the ground. Then she stamped down, pulverizing the golem and cratering the floor by a third of a meter.
A fourth golem closed, only for Rin to punch its torso with both fists in the time it took the lumbering behemoth to draw a fist back. It didn't explode. It didn't shatter.
It just crumbled into dust that billowed away from Rin.
Then she blinked, as she felt her sister flicker through space itself past her…
…and there she was, a beam saber in each hand, a flurry of light and darkness that left the last two golems in pieces and smoking patches of molten rock and metal on the floor.
"I was never that good in Kung Fu." Sakura admitted. "I…never really liked having to fight without a weapon, at least up close. Long-distance fighting, sure. Just throw spells at them. But up close…"
She trailed off, but Rin just smiled and patted Sakura's shoulder, squeezing it reassuringly. "We all have our preferences." She said. "Believe me…I could never use swords as well as you can."
Sakura smiled back, and nodded at Rin, who also nodded back. "Let's keep moving." She said.
"Right."
At that, the sisters continued to advance, making their way through the villa in the direction of the tower, where their intelligence indicated the Forvedge magus had based himself. As they entered another room, gas began to hiss, and then the smell of almonds filled the air, building to overpowering.
"Hydrogen cyanide…" Rin remarked. "…the bastard's trying to gas us."
"I've got gas masks and general antitoxin." Sakura said, already moving to open portals to Imaginary Numbers Space.
"No need." Rin said, pulling out a gem and tossing it to the center of the room. "Reinigungspflicht: Zersetzung und Recycling."
The gem exploded with a flash of light, and while gas continued to hiss, the smell of almonds quickly faded. The hydrogen cyanide in the air was already breaking down and being converted into nitrogen, water, and carbon dust, the former with the help of the oxygen already in the air. And while more hydrogen cyanide was still pouring into the room from wherever it was coming from, it was just as quickly being broken down and recycled.
Of course, that wasn't all that was in the room. More golems appeared, eight of them this time, metal and stone lumbering towards the sisters. Rin sighed, and then falling into a stance, leapt forward with enough force to strike divots from the ground. Sakura was right next to her, beam sabers glowing, the Tohsaka sisters going through the golems like a hot knife through butter.
Little Rin hummed to herself as she pranced around the ruined atrium. She'd already sucked the life out of the corpses, as while the bodies they made up weren't alive anymore, plenty of cells and germs still lived.
Her sister – and, though she didn't like to admit it, their mother – had always taught her to leave a clean plate after every meal.
And so she did, right down to the mitochondrial energies.
Then she blinked, looking up at the sky and into the distance. There was a sound, very low at first, but getting louder with every passing moment…
…oh. She knew that sound. She'd never ridden one before, but she'd heard them before, more from her video games than in real life, but she knew it.
Helicopters…
…but who?
The police? The army? That could be problematic.
Or more Forvedge thugs?
Things would be so much easier if that were the case.
With a loud roar, rockets erupted from the approaching helicopters, and blanketed the island with fire and explosions. Little Rin vanished in the explosions, the helicopters flying past before flying around the villa, one of them hovering close to the tower, aiming to evacuate the Forvedge magus trapped on its top floor.
A fireball whooshed out of the smoke in the atrium, and blew said helicopter apart. Then the other two helicopters began to stall, flying through the air in a way they weren't supposed to, and as the men inside screamed and flailed helplessly, slammed against each other in a ball of fire and shredded metal.
Little Rin gestured, and blew the smoke away. She sniffed…
…and then pain…
…cold…
…it was like she was floating away…
…like nothing mattered anymore…
…she could just…let go…and not…care…anymore…
…Sakura…
She didn't think.
She just did.
The Tohsaka Crest answered, forcing her spirit back together, and anchoring her back to the World.
Little Rin screamed, and sinking her claws into the young Icecolle magus who'd almost succeeded in exorcising her, ripped his soul out of his body. His circuits protested, but there were so few of them, and what he had was trash compared to those she and her sister had.
Then taking advantage of the fact that in this state she looked nowhere near Human, she stretched her jaws wide, and swallowed the Icecolle's soul whole.
"You alright?" Rin asked with evident worry.
"No, I am not." Sakura growled. "Someone just tried to exorcise our sister. If not for the Tohsaka Crest, they'd have succeeded. Don't worry, though, I can sense she's fine, and already made them pay for it."
"…I am so throwing that Forvedge bastard out a window." Rin growled.
"Agreed." Sakura said before narrowing her eyes. "But first, we need to get past this final obstacle."
This was the base of the tower, and it was here that Forvedge placed his greatest defenses. Four altars stood around the room, dripping with the blood and viscera of animal sacrifices. More sacrifices adorned the center of the room, impaled on iron spikes sticking out from metal slabs shaped into stern faces and engraved with Cyrillic characters.
Evil spirits ghosted around the room, and would have since attacked…
…had Sakura not setup a circle of protection.
It was simple, really. She placed both hands on the ground, and caused a circle of light to appear around them. The spirits hurled themselves at the circle, but couldn't get past.
"This will be over quickly." Sakura said, pulling out an arrow from Imaginary Numbers Space. Rin looked on curiously, before her eyes widened in surprise as Sakura stabbed the arrow through a hand, and coating it with blood. Then she pulled it out, before taking a silver pentacle from her belt.
She put prana into it, and in an instant, she was holding a longbow in one hand. "Watch this." She said with just an air of boastfulness.
Rin raised an eyebrow before smiling indulgently. Sakura nocked the arrow, drew, aimed at the one of the metal slabs, and then loosed.
The arrow punched halfway through the slab, and caused the Forvedge mysteries to collapse with a shower of sparks. Blood dried and viscera shriveled up. Metal screamed as the slabs crumpled, and with a last, anguished scream, the spirits vanished.
"See?" Sakura boasted. "What'd I tell you? Over and done quickly."
Rin smiled, and with a shake of her head, gave her sister a thumb up. "Come on." Sakura said. "The sooner we can toss this Forvedge bastard out a window, the sooner we can get out of here."
"Don't forget," Rin reminded her with a singsong voice. "We still have to torch the place."
"Oh yeah." Sakura said with a nod. "Thanks for the reminder."
Rin laughed and nodded. "You're welcome." She said.
Sharing a smile between them, they made their way up the stairs, to the tower's uppermost floor, where stood an ironbound door, the last obstacle between them and their quarry. The sisters shared a look, and then nodding at each other, jointly kicked the door down.
A/N
The Tohsaka sisters continue to kick ass, and not just the living ones, but also the unliving one. The last probably took more scalps than the previous two.